Categories
Observations

Pointy work shoes: The abomination fit only for the junior account executive

I’ve long held the view that proper work shoes — those that go nicely with a smart suit — do not turn up off the floor at the front, nor should they be pointy.

If they’re pointy then your feet will only fit into the main forward section, leaving the rest of the front to turn upwards. It looks shocking.

Hardly a day goes by when I don’t see somebody wearing these kind of shoes.

There’s nothing wrong with doing so. It just doesn’t strike me as professional. Using the traditional footwear of Court Jesters and Santa’s elves is not professional.

It really does wind me up to see them.

I’m guilty of this though. I hate to admit it. A while ago my wife made me buy some utterly shit £300 pair of “smart shoes” (to wear at the weekends). I ended up with this shocker of a pair that she thought looked cool. Me? Well I felt like a fraud, even at weekends. And I was slipping all over the place in them. I was wound up even more given the fact these shoes were piss-poor quality. Made for a tenner and branded at £300. They started to come apart after a few months.

I shouldn’t argue. I hadn’t been organised enough to go to Trickers and sort out some better casual ones so I ended up in Selfridges browsing these abominations.

Casual footwear is, I suppose, ok, when it comes to Court Jester pointy-turn-up-at-the-front shoes. But in a business context? It’s the equivalent of arriving at a meeting in a £75,000 sooped-up 1987 Ford Fiesta: Certainly expensive but fundamentally at the bottom of the rung in quality terms.

My preferred choice for footwear is Trickers — but I’ve had reasonable experiences with stuff from Churchs (is it Churches? Church’s?).

Where do you get your shoes from? And please, dear reader, tell me you don’t own a pair of pointy-lift-off-the-front shoes?

[Photo from Office.co.uk]

By Ewan

Ewan is Founder and Editor of The Pursuit of Quality. He is a quality addict and would sooner wait an extra month to earn the money to buy something better!